[meteorite-list] What a surprise! (not)

From: lebofsky at lpl.arizona.edu <lebofsky_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 05:04:40 -0700 (MST)
Message-ID: <63897.71.226.60.25.1209729880.squirrel_at_timber.lpl.arizona.edu>

Hi Sterling:

You forgot overnight mail; Pony Express. It took 11 days (Missouri to
California) and initially cost $5.00 for 1/2 oz. Assuming beer was 2 bits
(25 cents), that is a lot of beer!

Larry

On Thu, May 1, 2008 11:37 pm, Sterling K. Webb wrote:
> Postal Doug,
>
>
> Of course, the U.S. Mail is subsidized and
> supported by law -- it's a government service, as the National Posts of
> many nations are. I believe, as Mr. Franklin did, that governments
> exist to provide useful and necessary services for its citizens, and a
> mandate to establish a postal service was part of the Constitution, one of
> the first National Posts in the world.
>
> Originally, the price of post was prohibitive
> for the ordinary citizen. In 1792, long distance mail (450+ miles) cost 25
> cents per sheet of paper, and that 1792 "quarter" was worth many dollars in
> today's money (OK, I didn't look it up). When stamps were introduced in
> 1847,
> the cost plummeted. In 1855, you could send an entire letter of several
> sheets, in an envelope now, 3000 miles for 3 cents, a rate that persisted
> for a century.
>
> It made a single communicative entity out of a
> scattered nation. During that century, telegrams were costly and the later
> long distance phone call was too; they were reserved for deaths, births,
> wars, and occasionally true love, but you could write someone a letter
> every single day of the week for no more than the cost of a loaf of bread.
>
> One consideration to bear in mind about
> overseas shipments is that a single rate applies to an entire nation, even
> though Southern California to London is twice as far as Maine
> to London, whereas any part of the UK is no more distant from another than
> the ends of a state like Illinois. And all National Posts are only doing
> "half" the work when they each
> reciprocally entrust a package to the National Post of any other country.
> (The UK Royal
> Post once directed a 12-string guitar intact to
> my door from London for less money than UPS charged to damage a guitar from
> Wisconsin,
> one state away, in transit.)
>
> As for "sacred" mailboxes, they are sanctified
> by an extension of the personal privacy of the recipient; mail "delivered"
> there has become part of the "every man's home's his castle" right, and the
> prohibition against others entering it long precedes the invention of
> FedEx.
>
>
> Who, since they came up, once "delivered" a
> brand-new hard drive to a mud puddle in my driveway, and tossed another
> parcel behind my neighbor's shrubbery to languish there for a week until
> discovered by them whilst raking leaves, and once, by accident I think,
> they got a package within six feet of my door. Remind me to tip the FedEx
> man next Christmas, will you? In between my drinking toasts to the virtues
> of free enterprise, that is.
>
> Postal Sterling
> ----------------------------------------------------------
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <mexicodoug at aim.com>
> To: <meteoriteguy at yahoo.com>; <meteoritekid at gmail.com>;
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Thursday, May 01, 2008 10:31 PM
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] What a surprise! (not)
>
>
>
> "Actually cheaper to send overseas for less than one ounce packet, than
> to send to my next door neighbor. The US government shows us how smart it
> is again."
>
> Hi Mike, List,
>
>
> You're mixing apples and oranges. It should be cheaper, since when
> does reason have place in corrupt systems of any nation? The US postal
> service is only doing half the work for intentionsl shipments. They put
> it on a cargo flight from their hub and forget about it.
>
> Meanwhile in the USA they have a monopoly on home delivery so they milk
> the cash cow, so why shouldn't you pay more? It's a US federal crime for
> anyone to send regular mail through a private service for anyone to offer
> the service, and for anyone else delivering anything to open their sacred
> mailboxes - even though they are the homeowners' personal property and
> expense. Only urgent mail is excluded from the monopoly; provided the
> competing service charges at least twice as much. So next time you are
> pissed about fedex, ups, dhl, etc., keep in mind that they are more
> expensive because your government forces them to charge at least twice as
> by law much AND denies them participation in the economies of scale of the
> bulk of mailings.
>
> Something to keep in mind next time you pat the USPS on the back for
> being the cheapest of shipping options.
>
> Going postal,
> Doug
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael Farmer <meteoriteguy at yahoo.com>
> To: Jason Utas <meteoritekid at gmail.com>; Meteorite-list
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Thu, 1 May 2008 2:52 pm
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] What a surprise! (not)
>
>
>
>
> A 20 gram Henbury can be shipped to the UK for under
> $2.00. The minumum for one ounce to the USA in a
> bubble envelope is now $1.13, yet I can send the same bubble envelope to
> the UK for $1.01. Actually cheaper to send overseas for less than one
> ounce packet, than to send to my next door neighbor. The US government
> shows us how smart it is again. Michael Farmer
> --- Jason Utas <meteoritekid at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>> Hello Herman, Dave, All,
>> Regardless of whether or not he discounted shipping,
>> he did still 'lift' a description that was written by someone
>> else - without asking for the right to use it. This has been noted as an
>> issue in the past, and it is clear that (although he did well to find a
>> cheaper shipping service) wayner44 still made a mistake in copying a
>> description which he could easily have, at the very least, credited to
>> the author. I see no excuse for doing what he did - except for laziness.
>> Furthermore, who on earth would pay more than a few
>> dollars to ship a twenty gram bit of Henbury? I think you're looking at
>> this the wrong way; it should have cost only a few dollars to ship it in
>> the first place. He discounted it $9 from...what, exactly? Needless to
>> say, it would have been ridiculous had he *not* changed the shipping
>> cost. What he did was not a shining example of charity,
>> ingenuity, or intelligence. What he did was reasonable, nothing more - to
>> say nothing of his plagiarism. Regards,
>> Jason
>>
>>
>> On Thu, May 1, 2008 at 10:01 AM,
>> <Metorman46 at aol.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Hello Dave;
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks for the positive,pleasant post about
>>>
>> wayner44.He sure made your
>>> day,i'll bet,and you sure made my day with such a
>> positive post about someone who
>>> did good and we never would have known about it if
>> you hadn't taken the time
>>> to inform us.My hat is off to you.
>>>
>>> Best Regards;Herman Archer IMCA 2770.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> **************Need a new ride? Check out the
>>>
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>>> listings at AOL Autos.
>>>
>>
> (http://autos.aol.com/used?NCID=aolcmp00300000002851)
>
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Received on Fri 02 May 2008 08:04:40 AM PDT